There are many angles to the U.S. capture and removal of Nicolas Maduro from power in Venezuela. Assuming this is curtains for his regime — not yet a done deal, but one that the Venezuelan opposition will presumably be trying to bring about immediately — we should consider how it will affect a major regional dynamic: ending the exodus of Venezuelan refugees from the country.
According to figures from the UN Refugee Agency (take that with a grain of salt), “nearly 7.9 million people have left Venezuela in search of protection and a better life. The majority – more than 6.9 million people – are hosted in Latin American and Caribbean countries.” That’s a huge outflow from a country of some 28 million people.
The impact in the United States has been a trigger for political and legal controversy, including court battles over the outgoing Biden administration in January 2025 trying to insulate Venezuelans with Temporary Protected Status from having their status changed by the incoming administration. But don’t sleep on the impact that the refugee crisis has had on the politics of the rest of the region. The surge of hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan refugees into Chile played a huge role in the victory of the conservative José Antonio Kast in that country’s presidential election in December, with Kast pledging to build a Trumpian wall across the country’s northern border. It’s also been a factor in the rightward shift of Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia, and Peru, with an estimated 2.8 million Venezuelan refugees coming to Colombia (a nation of 53 million) and 1.7 million to Peru (a nation of 34 million). These are staggering figures for countries of this size, far less wealthy than the United States, to absorb.
In the immediate aftermath of the strike, Colombia is mobilizing its military along the Venezuelan border to stop a further influx of refugees. But longer term, the end of the Maduro regime could significantly reduce the outflow of desperate Venezuelans fleeing his oppressive and immiserating narco-socialist dictatorship. Kamala Harris was famously dispatched to the Central American “triangle” to address the “root causes” of refugees leaving that region. This could be what a real strike at those roots looks like.